What a wonderful Christmas we had and I hope each of you did too. This has been a busy week leading up to Christmas. We had movies on Tuesday and Friday nights for 2 weeks leading up to Christmas. The community comes and joins us. We were happy to be rained out one night but postponed the movie until the next night. We were happy to have needed rain.This past Wednesday night we went caroling in our lorry (big truck) and at each place we stopped added more people to the truck. We ended up with about 40 people squeezed in! We gave out sweets to all the people we sang for. Thursday was a holiday …

The container from Sebastopol Christian Church arrived on Saturday last week (10th of December). It was quite an experience to get it here; in fact it could be a movie script!One of doctors left on Saturday at 6:30 a.m. to go to Chinhoyi with the driver and they only got about 5 miles away from the hospital when they found the truck bringing the container had broken down on our big hill (Dzimaiwei Hill—which means “Oh my goodness” hill) since the night before. The driver came back to tell us and quickly Major took off with the Land Rover and tractor to pull it up the hill. They got there by 7:30 a.m. and went to work. The doctor and driver went on to Chinhoyi (3 hours away) while Major went to work trying to get the t…

Hysterectomy at Chidamoyo with Dr. Kabanzi and Dr. Kellert and myself doing anesthesia

Thanksgiving dinner at Chidamoyo

Students enjoying all that food!

Major is getting ready to eat!

Thanksgiving was celebrated here on Sunday November 27th. Thanksgiving Day is not a holiday here and so it is always a busy day and no time to cook the feast—so we usually have it on Saturday, but Major and family wanted to go home to plant that weekend so we had it Sunday night after church. We had Major and wife Patience, Dr. Kabanzi, Dr. Kellert and 3 medical students from University of Zimbabwe who are here for 4 weeks with us. We started by explaining what Thanksgiving was and they really got into the eating part!We had planned on having chicken because turkey is hard to come by and very expensive here, but the driver didn’t get to the butchery in time to pick up the chickens I ordered and paid for, so we had one small chicken and roast pork with all the trimmings! We had a table fu…

Mr. Mereki 20 years and Mrs. Mereki 10 years getting their certificate from Dr. Kabanzi

Presenting certificates

Long Service Award Dinner

Dinner for Long Service Awards

Dr. Kellert sewing up a leg

TOP TEN THINGS YOU LEARN WHEN YOU HAVE NO ZESA* FOR 5 DAYS IN A ROW(ZESA is the name of our electric supply company in Zimbabwe and stands for “Zimbabwe electricity Seldom Available!)10. It is your fault that ZESA went out because you bought extra meat, had 2 pigs slaughtered, filled the freezers full for a staff party on Saturday this week.9. Everyday you struggle to call the ZESA fault line on Skype( because there is no cell phone coverage when there is no electricity) with your battery back up with a small amount of time before it will die, to report that you still have no electricity. The answer you get everyday is “has this been reported?”8. You learn quickly not to wear that headlight flash light that is so great because it leaves your hands free to do things. As the only light in the ro…

Pediatric extension and Nurse station and Trauma room under construction

Major, myself, Dr. Kajese, Dr. Kellert and Dr. Kabanze

The 3 Doctor K's

Well it has been another busy week in Club Chid. The three Doctor K’s are all working hard and Dr. Kellert got to do her first C/Section with Dr. Kajese on Wednesday evening. It went well and she is now used to our instruments, sutures and non-disposable everything—don’t throw those gloves away—we reuse them!! The C/Section was done on Lori’s maid who had come the day before to clean Dr. Kellert’s house—that put her into labor. I told her she should have tried that on her patients in the US “clean my house and you will go into labor!”The building continues on the Peds extension and also the Nurses Station/Trauma…

Dr. Kellert in office New X-ray room next to theater (from OPD veranda)

New X-ray room

New X-ray room

Building the new Nurses station and Trauma room

Trauma Room/ Nurses Station

Pediatric Extension

After 5 months of correspondence back and forth, and applications, sold house and moving, and waiting for a medical license in Zimbabwe —Dr. Cheryl Kellert and OB/GYN from the US arrived on Tuesday November 1st to become our 3rd doctor! Who would have thought! After so many years of no doctor, then 1 doctor, then 2 doctors and now a third—wow!

She arrived here on Tuesday evening and we had dinner for her with the other doctors and Major and Patience. Then she gladly went off to bed after 2 days of straight flying. She left Connecticut in a big snowstorm and arrived to 110 weather here—wow what a shock on the body—but she has done well and was up in the morning to start work!

We have been busy getting her house ready and an exam room ready. While we are building a new X-ray room we are now usin…

Dr. Kellert on far right with Sylvia, Major and friend in Seattle in July

Well summer has finally come and with a vengeance. It has been not less than 118 for the past 4 days! Last night it was 92 when I went to bed at 10 p.m. and no electricity, so no fan until finally at 11:30 p.m. the electricity came on and was off by 5:15 a.m. We all feel very lethargic and can’t wait to jump in the pool after work. With no electricity during the day this week it makes it hard to work in our offices without air from a fan. I run and do as much paperwork outside my office on the veranda in between patients to get some air—even if it is hot—it feels cool! Somehow we have to figure out how to work outside, but most patients might object to be examined in the open!We have some exciting news to share! I was contacted in June by Dr. Cheryl Kellert from Washington State. She is an OB/GYN that I worked with in 1989-1991 in Santa Rosa, CA. For years I have been trying to get an OB/GYN to come on a workin…

This has been one of those weeks (I have been saying that a lot lately!) Our new doctor—Dr. Kabanzi has been all by himself as Dr. Kajese went off to pick up his new car from the Zambia/ Zimbabwe boarder over the weekend and planned to be back here by Monday. On Monday he received word that his father-in-law had a stroke and was in the hospital and so he and his wife left for Bulawayo to assess the situation. While they were taking care of the father-in-law in the hospital, his own father visiting his sister in Bulawayo got sick. He recently had one kidney removed in February and now was anemic with cardiac failure and his only kidney left seemed to be in renal failure. So the whole week they have been trying to get proper medical care for the fathers, which is always a challenge in Zimbabwe.I got back on F…